


All Fade Out

by Waffle-o (XylB)



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: FAHC, GTA Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-11
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-02-01 00:37:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12693423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XylB/pseuds/Waffle-o
Summary: “Someone needs to do it,” Ryan spits, dropping his heavy guns on the ground and rolling his shoulders as he looks up at the building, flames licking at the window frames and whipping up the sides.





	All Fade Out

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Collide" by Breathe Carolina.

“Jeremy! _Jeremy_!”

“He’s not answering his comms - "

“I don’t think he can hear you - "

“Ryan, what are – what are you doing?”

“Hey, no, no, Ryan, _don’t_ \- "

“Someone needs to do it,” Ryan spits, dropping his heavy guns on the ground and rolling his shoulders as he looks up at the building, flames licking at the window frames and whipping up the sides.

“Just fucking _wait_ , they’ll get here soon - "

“I don’t have _time_ to wait, Geoff.”

“Ryan - “

“Neither does he.”

“Ryan! It’s too dangerous, don’t you fucking dare - "

“ _I don’t care_.”

Michael grabs at Ryan’s shoulder and Ryan shoots him a glare, his lips twisted into a snarl – Michael doesn’t let go.

“He’s fine,” Michael says. “For fuck’s sake, Ryan, just wait until help gets here.”

Ryan narrows his eyes and shoves Michael’s hand away – Michael snags his arm again and Ryan whirls around to him, pushing at him and daring Geoff to try anything with a pointed glare.

“Two minutes,” Geoff says. “They’ll be here in two minutes.”

“You’re not fucking stopping me,” Ryan growls.

“I don’t fucking understand why you can’t just wait for two goddamn _minutes_ \- "

“I don’t _expect_ you to understand!”

“Then fucking _tell_ us!”

“You’d do the same for Gavin!” Ryan shouts at Michael.

“You think I don’t want to save Jeremy as well?!” Michael yells back, gesturing to the building. “For fuck’s sake, you think I don’t want to save my friends?!”

Ryan sets his jaw and glances between them, swallowing back the panic threatening to overwhelm him.

“I’m going in,” he says, steel and iron and nothing else.

“Yeah, and what if you fucking die, huh?!” Michael spits.

“Then they’ll have to pull my body out as well,” Ryan hisses before turning on his heel, ignoring Geoff’s and Michael’s shouting as he storms away to the building.

He stops in front of the door. Unsheathes his pistol. Doesn’t look back. Pretend the lump in his throat is from the smoke.

The wood crumbles satisfyingly under his boot when he kicks the door in, pulling his shirt up to cover his nose and mouth as smoke rushes out to greet him, then enveloping him when he steps in.

It’s more disorienting with the layout burnt to ash and smoke, the flames licking at exposed columns and the heat singing Ryan’s eyelashes.

 _Jeremy_.

Ryan blinks and doesn’t hesitate to run through the thick smoke, mentally mapping out the building as he tries to figure out where Jeremy would have ended up after the job – fifth floor, he thinks, or second, tucked in a corner where a conference room would be.

Ryan glances up at a hole in the ceiling.

There’s no fifth floor left to check.

The flames roar around a plastic printer as Ryan fights his way to the stairs, kicking aside burning wood and melted chairs and shooting down a flaming chandelier – the stairs themselves are stone, but the handhold scorches Ryan’s palm when he trips and tries to right himself, sucking in a smoky breath and coughing it all out while he ascends the warped stairs.

There’s not much second floor left, giant holes burnt through the floor and the carpet in the centre, so Ryan sticks to around the walls and starts up a jog towards the corner, where he knows one of the conference rooms is.

There’s nothing in this one but a fiery table and clumps of melted plastic chairs – Ryan leaves the door hanging off one hinge and heads over to the other corner room, his nose stinging from the acrid smoke and his lungs filled with the stuff, coughing on every breath and constantly wiping tears from his eyes to see more clearly.

The door for this room is melted into the frame, doesn’t budge when Ryan pushes at it with his shoulder. He growls and kicks ferociously at it – when that doesn’t work, he charges it with his shoulder again, tears springing up at the sharp ache that twists through ragged scar tissue. He lifts the gun to shoot the hinges and when he shoves into it now he bursts into the conference room, stumbling forward until he hits the table and groaning when it digs into his abdomen.

Ryan quickly steadies himself to sweep the room, his eyes jumping from the shrivelled plants to the window to the chairs to the end table to – his gaze snaps back over to the hint of purple it caught on and he crouches to see Jeremy under the table, huddled up and coughing violently with his shirt pressed over his nose and mouth, eyes squeezed shut against the smoke building in the room.

“Jeremy,” Ryan says, muffled through his shirt and hand. “ _Jeremy_!”

Ryan reaches forward to slap Jeremy’s elbow and Jeremy jerks, his eyes flying open to lock with Ryan’s, red-rimmed and shiny, and before Ryan can pull his hand away, Jeremy’s shoots forward to grab his wrist, holding him where he is as Jeremy’s shoulders rise and fall with his laboured breathing. Ryan presses his fingers to Jeremy’s thundering pulse and reluctantly tugs his hand away to sign – _We need to go_.

Jeremy nods and another coughing fits wracks him, wet and hacking and sharp against the crackling flames. He sucks in a breath and keeps his eyes on Ryan as Ryan guides him out from under the table – Jeremy sways when he’s on his feet and Ryan wraps an arm around his shoulders to keep him steady, the pistol pressed to Jeremy’s shoulder as they make their way out of the conference room.

A section of floor falls away with a loud _crack_ when they reach the other corner – Jeremy jumps and grasps at Ryan’s jacket and Ryan tries not to look at the drop, instead glancing at Jeremy’s singed clothes, holes burnt through the hems of his trousers, but there doesn’t seem to be much damage to him otherwise.

Ryan holds him tighter and they half-walk, half-jog down the stairs and onto the ground floor again, Ryan practically dragging Jeremy around melting cubicles.

A wooden beam squeals and crashes to the floor at the base of the stairs and Ryan skids to a stop, nearly toppling them both over as smoke gushes into their lungs, embers popping and sparkling and the wood burning fiercely in front of them. Both of them double over coughing, but Ryan shoots at the weakened middle and the wood snaps in half, sharp splinters raining down onto the floor – with no hesitation and with a mostly limp Jeremy by his side, Ryan kicks at half of the beam and manages to shift it enough to squeeze past, the splinters poking at his legs and side but they get through unharmed.

There’s not far to go, not if they’re careful.

Jeremy abruptly shouts and trips on a stray block of debris and nearly twists Ryan’s shoulder out of its socket on his way down – Ryan panics and stumbles with him, struggling to steady both of them again and lungs burning with smoke and effort as he navigate them through more debris, under the giant hole in the ceiling. Jeremy clutches at his shirt, his shoulder pressing painfully into a fractured rib, but Ryan just holds him closer and breathes through the pain, tears slipping down his cheeks from the smoke and his head pounding from the heat – beside him, Jeremy’s getting weaker and weaker with each step, still coughing and still shuddering every time he breathes.

Flames lick at Ryan’s leather jacket as they tumble out of the building, fresh air rushing in so fast and so _pure_ it’s dizzying – Ryan blinks and lets go of his shirt to steady Jeremy better, yanking his shirt away from his mouth and stopping to face him as Jeremy sucks in desperate breaths, coughing into his elbow and glancing up at the building.

Distantly Ryan acknowledges the fire engines now parked beside the building, the wild sprays of water from Gavin and Jack as they try to tame the fire – glass shatters and lands on the ground beside them in a spray of jagged shards and Ryan’s quick to move them out of the way, more towards where Michael and Geoff are yelling.

He doesn’t pay attention to Michael and Geoff when they run up to them, Michael surely shouting about something important and Geoff probably hyperventilating – instead he steps closer to Jeremy and drops the pistol.

“Jeremy,” he says, his voice raspy from smoke. “ _Jeremy_.”

“Ryan,” Jeremy wheezes, his voice even more ruined, but there’s relief in his eyes, in the way he grasps at Ryan’s jacket.

Ryan opens his mouth to speak again, to say what he doesn’t know, but everything flies out of his mind when Jeremy yanks him in and crashes their lips together, messy and off-centre but fierce and passionate. His lips taste like smoke and ash against Ryan’s and Ryan’s heart seizes up in his chest, leaps into his throat as he pulls Jeremy in just as desperately, breathless all over again. His ears are still pounding with his own pulse, drowning out everything but the roaring flames and the minute hitch of Jeremy’s breath when Ryan kisses back.

“Oh,” Michael says next to them when they separate, staring at each other like they’ve just seen each other for the first time – it’s a lot like the first time, Ryan thinks dizzily, like when they caught each other’s eyes after a fiery heist and Ryan immediately knew he was fucked.

This time Ryan greedily tugs Jeremy back in, his breath shuddering out against Jeremy’s lips as he squeezes his eyes shut and pretends that his heart isn’t skipping beats in his chest, that his eyes are stinging just from the smoke and not from the overwhelming relief threatening to sweep him off his feet.

“Shit,” Jeremy breathes, looking up at Ryan wide-eyed and shocked, ash smudged on his mouth from Ryan and dusty fingerprints imprinted on his cheek. “Ryan - "

“Since I met you,” Ryan whispers. “Fuck – I couldn’t – I couldn’t just leave you in there, Jeremy.”

“You didn’t have to - "

“ _Jeremy_ ,” Ryan pleads, trying to find words and failing, curling his fingers into Jeremy’s jacket and pressing their foreheads together. Jeremy seems to get it, nods quietly and grips at Ryan’s shirt.

“Thank you,” he says. Ryan nods and squeezes his eyes shut against the wave of emotion that washes over him, adrenaline and relief crashing together in a conflicting mess inside him.

Geoff and Michael have the decency to turn away, however awkwardly, when Jeremy reaches up to cup Ryan’s cheek, stroking his thumb under his eye and pulling him in for a hug when Ryan sniffles quietly.

“Hey, Geoffrey, what’s happening - "

“Gavin, I need you over here.”

“Shit, are they - "

“ _Gavin_. Over here. Now.”

 

“Since we met?” Jeremy asks a minute later, soft disbelief colouring his tone. “Really?”

Ryan nods.

“Really,” he replies.

Jeremy’s silent for a moment – Ryan can practically _hear_ him thinking.

“It’s – since I met you, as well,” Jeremy admits eventually, quietly, a shaky sigh pressed into Ryan’s neck with the confession.

“...really?”

“Really.”


End file.
